Contributions to Late Cretaceous Paleontology and Stratigraphy of New Mexico Part II
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New Mexico Bureau of Mines & Mineral Resources A DIVISION OF NEW MEXICO INSTITUTE OF MINING & TECHNOLOGY Contributions to Late Cretaceous paleontology and stratigraphy of New Mexico Part II SOCORRO 1988 11 NEW MEXICO INSTITUTE OF MINING & TECHNOLOGY Laurence H. Lattman, President NEW MEXICO BUREAU OF MINES & MINERAL RESOURCES Frank E. Kottlowski, Director George S. Austin, Acting Deputy Director BOARD OF REGENTS Ex Officio Garrey E. Carruthers, Governor of New Mexico Alan Morgan, Superintendent of Public Instruction Appointed Gilbert L. Cano, President, 1985-1989, Albuquerque Lenton Malry, Sec./Treas., 1985-1991, Albuquerque Robert 0. Anderson, 1987-1993, Roswell Donald W. Morris, 1983-1989, Los Alamos Steve Torres, 1967-1991, Albuquerque BUREAU STAFF Full Time ORIN J. ANDERSON, Geologist Lois M. DEVLIN, Director, Bus./Pub. Office BARBARA R. Popp, Biotechnologist RUBEN ARCHULETA, Technician II ROBERT W. EVELETH, Senior Mining Engineer IREAN L. RAE, Head, Drafting Section AL BACA, Crafts Technician ROUSSEAU H. FLOWER, Emeritus Sr. Paleontologist MARSHALL A. REITER, Senior Geophysicist JAMES M. BARKER, Industrial Minerals Geologist MICHAEL J. HARRIS, Metallurgist JACQUES R. RENAULT, Senior Geologist PAUL W. BAUER, Field Economic Geologist JOHN W. HAWLEY, Senior Env. Geologist ELIZABETH M. REYNOLDS, Geotech. Info. Ctr. Tech. ROBERT A. BIEBERMAN, Senior Petrol. Geologist CAROL A. HJELLMING, Assistant Editor JAMES M. ROBERTSON, Senior Economic Geologist JENNIFER R. BORYTA, Assistant Editor GARY D. JOHNPEER, Engineering Geologist GRETCHEN H. ROYBAL, Coal Geologist LYNN A. BRANDVOLD, Senior Chemist ANNABELLE LOPEZ, Staff Secretary WILLIAM J. STONE, Senior Hydrogeologist RON BROADHEAD, Petroleum Geologist THERESA L. LOPEZ, Receptionist/Staff Secretary SAMUEL THOMPSON Ill, Senior Petrol. Geologist Monte M. BROWN, Drafter DAVID W. LOVE, Environmental Geologist REBECCA J. TITUS, Drafter FRANK CAMPBELL, Coal Geologist JANE A. CALVERT LOVE, Associate Editor JUDY M. VAIZA, Executive Secretary ANISETTE G. CARROLL, Admin. Secretary I CECILIA ROSACKER MCCORD, Technician I MANUEL J. VASQUEZ, Mechanic STEVEN M. LATHER, Field Economic Geologist CHRISTOPHER G. McKEE, X-ray Laboratory Technician ROBERT H. WEBER, Emeritus Senior Geologist RICHARD CHAMBERLIN, Economic Geologist VIRGINIA MCLEMORE, Geologist DONALD WOLBERG, Vertebrate Paleontologist CHARLES E. CHAPIN, Senior Geologist LYNNE MCNEIL, Technical Secretary ZANA G. WOLF, Staff Secretary RICHARD R. CHAVEZ, Assistant Head, Petroleum NORMA J. MEEKS, Accounting Clerk—Bureau MICHAEL W. WOOLDRIDGE, Scientific Illustrator RUBEN A. CRESPIN, Garage Supervisor JEAN B. MOODY, Drafter JiRI ZIDEK, Chief Editor–Geologist DARRELL DAUDE, Computer Operator Research Associates CHRISTINA L. BALK, NMT JEFFREY A. GRAMBLING, UNM HOWARD B. NICKELSON, Carlsbad WILLIAM L. CHENOWETH, Grand Junction, CO JOSEPH HARTMAN, Univ. Minn. LLOYD C. PRAY, Univ. Wisc. PAIGE W. CHRISTIANSEN, Kitty Hawk, NC DONALD E. HATTIN, Ind. Univ. ALLAN R. SANFORD, NMT RUSSELL E. CLEMONS, NMSU ALonzo D. JACKA, Texas Tech. Univ. JOHN H. SCHILLING, Nev. Bur. Mines & Geology WILLIAM A. COBBAN, USGS DAVID B. JOHNSON, NMT WILLIAM R. SEAGER, NMSU AUREAL T. CROSS, Mich. St. Univ. WILLIAM E. KING, NMSU RICHARD H. TEDFORD, Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist. MARIAN GALUSHA, Amer. Mus. Nat, Hist. DAVID V. LEMONE, UTEP JORGE C. TOVAR R., Petroleos Mexicans LELAND H. GILE, Las Cruces JOHN R. MACMILLAN, NMT Graduate Students MARGARET BARROLL RICHARD HARRISON RICHARD P. LOZINSKY DIANE BELLIS TIM HOBBS WILLIAM MCINTOSH JOAN GABELMAN DAVID L. JORDAN Plus about 50 undergraduate assistants Original Printing Published by Authority of State of New Mexico, NMSA 1953 Sec. 63-1-4 Printed by University of New Mexico Printing Plant, March 1988 Available from New Mexico Bureau of Mines & Mineral Resources, Socorro, NM 87801 iii Contents The Late Cretaceous ammonite Spathites Kummel & Decker in New Mexico and Trans-Pecos Texas W. A. COBBAN 5-21 The Late Cretaceous ammonite Romaniceras Spath, 1923, in New Mexico W. J. KENNEDY & W. A. COBBAN 23-34 Middle Cenomanian (Late Cretaceous) molluscan fauna from the base of the Boquillas Formation, Cerro de Muleros, Dona Ana County, New Mexico W. J. KENNEDY, W. A. COBBAN & S. C. HOOK 35-44 5 The Late Cretaceous ammonite Spathites Kummel & Decker in New Mexico and Trans-Pecos Texas W. A. Cobban U.S. Geological Survey, Mail Stop 919, Box 25046, Federal Center, Denver, Colorado 80225, U.S.A. Abstract—Spathites was established for S. chispaensis Kummel & Decker, 1954, which is a synonym of Pseudotissotia? coahuilaensis Jones, 1938. Spathites is known in the United States only from rocks of middle Turonian age in New Mexico and western Texas. At least three chronologic species are present, from oldest to youngest S. rioensis Powell, S. coahuilaensis (Jones), and S. puercoensis (Herrick & Johnson). The first two have subpseudoceratitic sutures, whereas S. puercoensis has a decidedly pseudoceratitic suture. Spathites rioensis occurs in the subzone of Collignoniceras woollgari woollgari (Mantell), and S. coahuilaensis is found in the younger subzone of C. woollgari regulare (Haas). Spathites puercoensis occurs still higher in the zone of Prionocyclus hyatti. Rare inner whorls from two localities in New Mexico suggest the possibility of a fourth species that may lie between the zones of C. woollgari and P. hyatti. Introduction Pecos Texas. These localities are shown in Fig. 1, and data The genus Spathites was proposed by Kummel & Decker concerning the localities are given in Table 1. Prefix D in- (1954) for medium-sized, stout, involute ammonites that dicates Denver Mesozoic locality numbers; the rest are have inner whorls ornamented by ribs and tubercles (um- Washington, D.C., Mesozoic locality numbers. bilical and inner and outer ventrolateral) and outer whorls with reduced ornament. The suture is simplified. Kummel Sequence of species & Decker based their genus on S. chispaensis, which they The oldest known species of Spathites in North America is described as a new species from Trans-Pecos Texas and Powell, which occurs in the lower part of the Chihuahua, Mexico. S. rioensis Kennedy, Wright & Hancock (1980a) dealt extensively middle Turonian zone of Collignoniceras woollgari (Mantell). with the genus and noted that it had a time span of latest This zone was divided into a lower subzone of C. woollgari Cenomanian to middle Turonian and a geographic range woollgari (Mantell) and an upper one of C. woollgari regulare from North America to Europe, northern Africa, and east (Haas) (Cobban & Hook, 1979). An early form of S. rioensis across southern U.S.S.R. to southern India. Those authors was found at the base of the subzone of C. woollgari woollgari recognized the following species: Spathites (Spathites) chis- in western New Mexico (Fig. 1, locs. 6, 7). Specimens of paensis Kummel & Decker, S. (S.) rioensis Powell, S. (S.) this early form were assigned to Spathites aff. subconciliatus puercoensis (Herrick & Johnson), S. (S.) sulcatus (Wiedmann), (Choffat) (Cobban & Hook, 1983: 6), but in the present re- port they are better reassigned to S. (Jeanrogericeras) reveliereanus (Courtiller), and S. (J.) sub- S. rioensis. conciliatus (Choffat). Spathites coahuilaensis (Jones) has been found in the sub- Spathites is locally abundant in west-central and western zone of Collignoniceras woollgari regulare in west-central and New Mexico, where three chronologic species are known, western New Mexico. At locality D11450 (Fig. 1, loc. 32), from oldest to youngest S. rioensis, S. coahuilaensis (Jones), S. coahuilaensis was collected 7.3 m above beds that contain and S. puercoensis. The last species is especially common in C. woollgari woollgari. the Semilla Sandstone Member of the Mancos Shale in the Spathites puercoensis (Herrick & Johnson) has been found Rio Puerco valley northwest of Albuquerque. only in the youngest middle Turonian zone of Prionocyclus The present study was undertaken to more fully docu- hyatti (Stanton). Among the ammonites associated with S. ment the presence of Spathites in New Mexico and Trans- puercoensis are the forms illustrated by Kennedy, Wright & Pecos Texas. Collections on which this study was based Hancock (1980b, text fig. 2, pl. 45, figs. 1, 2) as Shuparoceras were made by many geologists of the U.S. Geological Sur- sp. nov. (Fig. 1, loc. 17) and Romaniceras (R.) kallesi (Záz- vey and the New Mexico Bureau of Mines & Mineral Re- vorka) (Fig. 1, loc. 16), both of which are herein reassigned sources. The largest collections were made by W. T. Lee to Romaniceras (R.) mexicanum Jones, 1938. in 1905, T. W. Stanton and J. G. Walthers in 1906, C. B. None of the American species of Spathites is known from Hunt and assistants in 1930-31, C. H. Dane in 1963, and S. Europe, where the genus also seems to be confined to the C. Hook, E. A. Merewether, N.A. La Fon, and me in 1978. middle Turonian. In the type region of the Turonian, Sau- All photographs were made by Robert E. Burkholder of murois and Touraine in northwestern France, two species, the U.S. Geological Survey. Drawings of sutures were S. (Jeanrogericeras) reveliereanum (Courtiller) and S. (J.) com-besi made by me. (Sornay), are present in the Tuffeau de Saumur at the same stratigraphic level as the ammonites Lewesiceras peramplum Geographic distribution (Mantell), Fagesia rudra (Stoliczka), Neoptychites cephalotus (Courtiller), N. xetriformis Pervinquiere, Kamerunoceras Spathites is present in 49 collections of fossils in the U.S. turoniense (d'Orbigny), Romaniceras kallesi Zazvorka